Welcome to ROAM!
In this blog, I am going to break down “how this works”. Starting a private practice is scary yet fun! If you haven’t scanned the website, please do!
To begin– I offer services covering eating disorder recovery, taking the disorder out of disordered eating, relative energy deficiency in sports-also known as female athlete triad or low energy availability- and intuitive eating.
Again, I am striving to become a certified eating disorder specialist so these topics in my private practice can be referral or self-referral; however, be aware the most effective treatment is building a team to support you that includes, physician, psychologist, nurses, licensed therapists, and family support. Your care is not limited to these people but understand if there are moments during our time that I may need to refer you to higher level of care, please understand it is because I want the best care given to you in your recovery journey. You may also already have a treatment team, and lacking the nutrition piece, well here I am!
Relative energy deficiency in sport (RED-S) is a new-ish term- some may have heard of the female athlete triad or low energy availability. RED-S is a syndrome referring to impaired physiological function caused by energy deficiency. First, we need to start with, what is “energy availability”? Energy availability is the amount of energy obtained from food minus exercise energy expenditure (how much energy you use to complete your work outs) to support remaining physiological functions (aka keep you alive). You’re probably thinking, Nikki, what are you trying to say? Here it is, if you are an active individual but notice your period has stopped, you keep getting stress fractures, abnormal labs regarding iron, estrogen (estradiol, progesterone, testosterone), or if your doctor has told you “oh your active, it’s okay to skip a period or two”. it could be due to lack of energy– not fueling the body enough to cover the exercise you’re doing and keeping you alive. During this process, your body starts to naturally cease functions to adapt, it’s in survival mode. To ensure you’re fueling correctly and jump start the physiological functions, I can help because it’s not normal to skip periods when you’re not taking birth control or on other medications that could affect this normal process. If this sounds familiar or you have more questions, please set up a discovery call to chat it out!
Lastly, intuitive eating is exactly what you may think– you eat intuitively. However, dieting culture makes this increasingly hard with each new “diet” that comes out. Let’s break this down– “intuitive” means based on what one FEELS to be true even without conscious reasoning. So basically, when you have that gut feeling for something. How well do you know yourself? Your body and what it is trying to tell you? If you are tired of dieting and ready to start listening to your body, we can do it together! I’ll be your accountability partner but first, I would suggest you to read “Intuitive eating” by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch. The most updated version of this book came out in June 2020!
Call me maybe? If you are interested in any of the above topics, please jump over to the website and set up a discovery call! This is a quick call that allows you to ask questions for free.99! Trust me- discovery calls are the best because it allows you to see if this is a good fit or you can ask a question or two to guide you to find the best fit! I’d love to work with everyone, I really would but in reality, my focus doesn’t cover everything. If you know my focus doesn’t fit what you’re looking for but still need guidance, feel free to hit up the contact form and ask your question(s). If I can help, I will definitely try to guide you in the right direction.
Dolla Dolla bills y’all. Currently, I am pursuing insurance coverage; however, that can take a minute to complete. It is important for me to ensure my clients have the option to use insurance to cover any eating disorder or disordered eating related journey’s. Depending on your insurance company, you can use your flexible spending account or be provided a superbill to get reimbursed through your insurance company. It is up to you to call prior to consultation. Otherwise, I accept all major forms of credit cards. Again, use the discovery call to ensure this is right for you and your wallet.